Monday; August 7

One of my favorite euphemisms for things being out of whack refers to the tail wagging the dog (as opposed to the dog wagging the tail).  While I have seen puppies whose whole bodies seem to be vibrating from a tail being wagged in excitement, the way things are supposed to work is that the tail is an extension of the dog and, as such, the dog controls the tail.   
The reason for the analysis of this saying is that there appears to be temptation for tail-wagging in our spiritual lives.   One of the more common challenges among today’s religious groups is how to make the message of God germane to our society.  I understand the challenge of getting people interested in the message of God, but when we begin to focus on God’s relevance to the world we may be missing a major point.  You see, God doesn’t need to prove His place in our lives … this is God’s world, it is our job to be pleasing to Him.  A person who refrains from living a spiritual life until its relevance is proven makes as much sense as a tail wagging a dog.  I know a lot of dogs who exist without a tail, but no tail can ever remain viable without its dog.  The parallel is that God can do just fine without us, but we will go nowhere (well, other than to hell) without Him.
As John paints a picture of glory in the Book of Revelation he relates a vision of creatures who praise God by saying, “Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created.”.  (Revelation 4:11)  The essence of the proclamation is that God created the universe and the universe has an obligation to serve Him.  To make it more personal, each one of us is a creation of God.  He doesn’t need to prove anything to us, we owe our existence to Him.
Let’s figure out how we can help our friends and neighbors see their status before God, but let’s never lose sight of the fact that God is the center of our world – things just don’t any more relevant than that!
Think About It!

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